Abstract
Office-building occupants’ behaviors during their arrivals and departures foreseeably have a large impact on a building's energy consumption since many occupants in control of appliances will turn their devices on or off at these entry and departure events. Consequently, occupants would have various types of energy-use patterns that coincide with their entry and departure events and that repeat over time. Despite the value that knowledge of such patterns would have on better tracking energy-use behaviors, these patterns have not been well explored with empirical data in the literature. Therefore, this paper studies occupants’ energy-use behaviors in office buildings to identify and investigate energy-use patterns at entry and departure events. In particular, this research evaluates (1) the delay intervals that manifest between the occupants’ entry/departure events and the beginning/end of the occupants’ energy-consuming behaviors, and (2) changes in electricity consumption caused by occupants at entry/departure events to identify recurring—and thereby predictable—energy-use patterns associated with individual occupants. In the pursuit of this objective, the energy-use behaviors of 12 occupants in two office buildings were tracked during a four-month period. Results from statistical analyses performed on the collected data reveal that an occupant in an office building typically follows a consistent, recurring delay-interval pattern. In addition, the results show each occupant also follows a recurring pattern of power changes at entry/departure events. By identifying recurring, occupant-specific energy-use behavior patterns, this study significantly contributes to the current body of research and can be used to support research efforts into energy-load disaggregation.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 77-87 |
Number of pages | 11 |
Journal | Building and Environment |
Volume | 136 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - May 15 2018 |
Keywords
- Energy-use patterns
- Entry and departure events
- Load disaggregation
- Occupant behavior
- Office building
- Personalized energy feedback
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Environmental Engineering
- Civil and Structural Engineering
- Geography, Planning and Development
- Building and Construction